@article {69659,
	title = {A global dopaminergic learning rate enables adaptive foraging across many options},
	journal = {bioRxiv},
	year = {2024},
	month = {2024 Nov 05},
	abstract = {<p>In natural environments, animals must efficiently allocate their choices across multiple concurrently available resources when foraging, a complex decision-making process not fully captured by existing models. To understand how rodents learn to navigate this challenge we developed a novel paradigm in which untrained, water-restricted mice were free to sample from six options rewarded at a range of deterministic intervals and positioned around the walls of a large ( 2m) arena. Mice exhibited rapid learning, matching their choices to integrated reward ratios across six options within the first session. A reinforcement learning model with separate states for staying or leaving an option and a dynamic, global learning rate was able to accurately reproduce mouse learning and decision-making. Fiber photometry recordings revealed that dopamine in the nucleus accumbens core (NAcC), but not dorsomedial striatum (DMS), more closely reflected the global learning rate than local error-based updating. Altogether, our results provide insight into the neural substrate of a learning algorithm that allows mice to rapidly exploit multiple options when foraging in large spatial environments.</p>
},
	doi = {10.1101/2024.11.04.621923},
	url = {https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.11.04.621923},
	author = {Grima, Laura L and Guo, Yipei and Narayan, Lakshmi and Hermundstad, Ann M and Dudman, Joshua T}
}
